Is It The End of Gender, or The Beginning of Men?

If you can’t see guys as good, maybe you’re looking in the wrong place.

For those of you who don’t know how The Good Men Project began, here it is. One day, Tom Matlack, with a decade’s worth of highly successful venture capitalism under his belt, decided to write a story. It was a personal story, an honest story. It was his story.

And he kept sending draft after draft to his former venture capitalist partner James, who was at the time on sabbatical in France with his family. And one day James said, “Tom, I love your story, really. But I can’t just can’t look at it yet again. Can you go out and get some stories of other men?”

And Tom said, “Great idea.”

Tom is known for working at lightening speed. He immediately went out and found other men and listened to them tell their stories. He noticed that guys would tend to talk about a defining moment in their life. The time when they thought they knew what was happening. The time when they thought they understood how it was all supposed to be working out, and then they suddenly turned around, and all their expectations had been shattered. And at the core of that defining moment was a moral dilemma—“how can I navigate my way through this mess and do what it takes to be a good man?” And so, The Good Men Project was born, a place that at its core was storytelling of raw, honest truths—stories that changed the teller and changed the listener.

♦◊♦

But why men?

We’re often asked, why not The Good Human Project? Why, in this day and age of gender equality and gender desegregation of all kinds, why focus on just men?

The key to making any idea work, to build a brand that has long-term value; even to create a story that has meaning is this: find a place to stand. Take a look at a worldview no one else is seeing. That will center you, allow you to have insights you can then share with others. Plant a flag where you are standing; stake your ground.

Nobody else was talking about men from the place Tom was, from a point of personal truths. Media for men was still trotting out the same old tired clichés: Men are only interested in sex and sports. Visuals of hot babes in bikini’s were all they’d look at. And when the media did tell stories of men, men invariably came across as philanderers or liars or villains or cheats. Not the multi-dimensional, multi-faceted, thoughtful struggling-to-get-it-right kind of guys that really exist.

For Tom, the reason to focus on men was also personal. The power in men’s stories was in the truths they told, and Tom’s view was that in the past it had been “socially less acceptable to get really honest as a guy.” For Tom, hearing men tell their stories packed that extra punch. “I hear something that unlocks an important clue about who I was meant to be in the world.”

When I first met Tom, he told me story after story of the guys he had been talking to. Then he handed me a half-finished manuscript. “You can read my own mess of a story in there if you want to.” He looked away. “It’s the stuff guys don’t usually talk about.”

♦◊♦

It gets harder and harder to navigate what we are supposed to believe about gender. Is it OK to use the word “macho?” Do we have to spell out “he” or “she” all the time? C’mon, why can’t we use the word they already? I got accused of using sexist language in one of my articles recently: “You always say ‘men and women’. You never say ‘women and men’. I think you privilege men,” said the commenter. Really? I thought to myself. But I am writing on a site that is about men. It’s times like these I feel as if there’s a new gender protocol manual that no one ever handed me.

There’s no doubt that there are some things we’d all like clarification on. Back in 2010, there was the sheer audacity of a title given to Hanna Rosin’s otherwise thoughtful piece, “The End of Men.“ It was a title meant to provoke and challenge, blame and infuriate. And beyond that, it’s just stupid. Who on earth would want The End of Men?

♦◊♦

Much of my life, I’ve been afraid of men. They were on the whole, bigger than me, stronger than me. My relationships with men hadn’t gotten off to such a great start. I was afraid of men because they were sexual creatures—as was I—and thus were both objects of my desire and a source of my nightmares. And I was afraid of men because they all seemed to have more money and more power and more presence when they walked in a room than I ever did.

Often I looked to feminism to solve the problems that I, as an individual, had with men. “Too hard to ask for the salary I deserve? I’ll wait ‘til feminism figures it out.”

I’ve since learned that it’s better to walk right up to men and actually talk to them.

♦◊♦

When I was growing up, women came in only two flavors. Either a woman was a sex object, preferably a thin, white, blonde with wavy hair and curvy curves; or she was a mom with an apron and apple pie. And part of what feminism did so well over the past few decades was change those one-dimensional stereotypes into a worldview that let us see women as multi-faceted, complex creatures who could do almost anything.

I think I was in 6th grade when a slogan started making the rounds: “a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.” Even with my brain in my small, prepubescent state, I remember thinking, “Well, no.” The problem is that fish don’t ever desire a bicycle. I would be hard-pressed to say there was ever a time in my life—even at times when I was most afraid—that I didn’t desire men. Not just sexually, of course. But as someone different, someone who had a worldview I didn’t. I desired men as part of the pattern of the world that makes it so interesting.

♦◊♦

My children all played ice hockey. It didn’t matter that three of them were girls, that when my oldest daughter started playing she was always the only female on the ice. But for the most part, hockey didn’t define them, there were other skills, other talents, other roles they played. For instance, they all participated in the yearly Christmastime community theater show.

Every year, the hockey games overlapped with the theater performances, and every season my life creaked under the stress of dashing from afternoon performance to hockey game to evening performance. My daughter Shannon was the 4th child in line to go through this ritual, and she knew the drill: “OK, Shannon, you get off stage, dash out the back door where I’ll have the car running and we’ll drive straight to the hockey rink.” Shannon put her equipment on in the car and we arrived just as her team was skating out to do warm-ups.

In the car after the game, Shannon burst into tears. “What’s wrong?” I asked, surprised. I thought the game had gone well. Shannon had gone out there and given her all.

“Mom, you have NO IDEA what it’s like to take off your hockey equipment in a locker room full of boys and be wearing an elf costume underneath.”

Why yes, honey, actually…I know exactly what that’s like.

♦◊♦

Every time we slip into a gender role that we think we’re supposed to be, instead of being who we are, that is pretty much what it feels like. You slip out of one preconceived notion about your gender only to find you have another one underneath. You take off your hockey equipment only to find you have an elf costume below.

I’ve talked about my humiliation about pretending to play golf in order to try to fit in with men at work. Or my obsession with trying to look good on the outside, because I thought that’s what men wanted. Beauty came at a cost to not only my soul, but to my ability to spend time doing things I really want to do—instead of spending time trying to look the way I thought I was supposed to look. My fear of being taunted for not appearing to be beautiful enough and feminine enough often brought me to tears. Which, of course, got me worrying about being “too emotional.”

But there are less dramatic ways that my struggle to be a women emanated itself. There was the taunting that I received as a kid for appearing too smart: “You’re too smart for your own good,” was said like a threat more times than I can remember. Even as an adult, the subtle way that people would roll their eyes or studiously ignore me when I said something I thought was somewhat intelligent. Do you know how hard it is to try to be smart but not appear smart? For the longest time, that was what I thought I had to do—downplay my intelligence, up play my looks. Being “too smart” was almost as much of an insult as “too ugly.” Even today, I struggle with that balance. Sentence by sentence, word by word. It’s why I write kind of casually, you know? It’s become part of my voice.

♦◊♦

The thing I want to be clear on—and the point that is most important here—is that as difficult as it was for me to be the type of female I thought I was supposed to be—I think men struggle as much or more with their role as men.

The thing that I had missed, the insight that took me far too long to learn, growing up with a feminist vantage point and looking through the lens of a woman was this:

I was taught to believe that the plight of women was so difficult that I failed to see that men had problems too.

It’s been working on The Good Men Project that’s changed me. I’ve since been shown “the man box”—the way in which men struggle with appearing to be a man the same way I struggled with appearing to be a women at all costs. I never before understood that men clearly saw themselves as “The Provider” in the family, and that’s often the reason they feel they have to so aggressively pursue money—simply to make sure their family is provided for. I had failed to notice the day-to-day acts of heroism so prevalent in males—I had been shown, so many times, the side of them that the media showed me, the side of villains or philanderers or couch potatoes. The dads shown on TV commercials as bumbling idiots hiding all of their wonderful instincts about child rearing and child caring and nurturing in an effort to “look male.” The stay-at-home dads who get ridiculed for that role the same way I felt humiliated for wanting to play golf with the office business strategists. And I’ve internalized what I see as a great truth that I wish more women would take note of: That the easiest way to break through the glass ceiling just might be to break down the walls first.

♦◊♦

When I had lunch with Tom Matlack the first time we met, he told me story after story about the guys he had talked to. And some had been in prison, or war, or battlefields of the mind. Some had struggled with addictions and some had felt failure in their ability to provide for their kids. All of those men had been able to internalize that struggle, move on, and talk honestly about what they went through in order to share their insights. And as Tom told me those stories, the last thing on my mind was that this was “The End of Men.”

About Lisa Hickey

Lisa Hickey is CEO of Good Men Media Inc. and publisher of the Good Men Project. "I like to create things that capture the imagination of the general public and become part of the popular culture for years to come." Connect with her on Twitter.

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68 Comments on "Is It The End of Gender, or The Beginning of Men?"

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Anonymous

3 years 24 days ago

🙂
Alison A Armstrong’s, ‘The Queen’s Code’, and her many resources including understandingmen.Com are amazing. She has talked to men for at least 20 years. She’s asking women to desist from emasculating men, and to really see the hero in each man. Amazing mission.

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Lars H

4 years 27 days ago

Maybe I have missed something important, but why is it so darned important whether one calls oneself a feminist or not? (I am new around here) I mean, there are so many definitions and practices of feminism, that labelling one as feminist can mean a lot of things. One can f.ex. be a feminist and care about the plight of men. bell hooks strikes me as a good example of this. I could probably also easily find feminists who don’t care about the plight and men (the same for non-feminists). So I don’t think you can necessarily deduce intent and… Read more »

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Cat

5 years 4 months ago

I just want to say THANK YOU for this article Lisa. I’m currently in university majoring in Anthropology with a minor in Women’s Studies, however I’m thinking of switching out of my minor and going to into Gender Studies for exactly the reason you described in your article. I’ve called my self a feminist for quite some time now. I’m what you’d describe as a physiological “feminine” female, but psychologically am not. And that is the precise reason I turned to feminism in the first place. I was tired of people making assumptions about me based on my assumptions (As… Read more »

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Amber J.

5 years 5 months ago

I think it really depends if you are speaking about job opportunities or being the head of the household because roles are definitely on the brink of shifting.

Wow, Did this article really say good men are in one or more of three situations: 1:In war or on a battlefield 2:struggling to pay child support 3:Prison Those men sound like disposable men. (their only utility is what they do for women) I submit the better man is one who is not caught up in such situations,one who *gasp* actually lives life for himself first. (just like a woman) We are more than what we do for women,geez whiz it so hard to understand the radical concept that men are human beings? It’s being taken for granted that is… Read more »

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mjay

5 years 7 months ago

“If a young man gets married, starts a family, and spends the rest of his life working at a soul-destroying job, he is held up as an example of virtue and responsibility. The other type of man, living only for himself, working only for himself, doing first one thing and then another simply because he enjoys it and because he has to keep only himself, sleeping where and when he wants, and facing woman when he meets her, on equal terms and not as one of a million slaves, is rejected by society. The free, unshackled man has no place… Read more »

Thats a mignificent piece of writing, no point in writing more, theres nothing more to say.

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Peter Houlihan

5 years 7 months ago

“But now that he`s gone and I read this article, I have good faith.”

Hugo’s gone?

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Chris

5 years 7 months ago

Yes, he resigend.

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Chris

5 years 7 months ago

This is a truly great articel. I usually came here to analyze people, who in my opinion have it all wrong, feminists like Hugo Schwyzer. But now that he`s gone and I read this articel, I have good faith. that the goodmenproject is moving in a very positive direction. Feminism is not needed for gender equality, I even think it is working against it. My sister lied to her boyfriend about liking video games and skateboarding in her teens, much like you pretended to golf to your collegues, for getting accepted. The thing is women don`t have to do this… Read more »

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

A few days ago there was a thread on goals for the website and what people got out of it. For me the answer is easy: Lisa Hickey. I went through and read everything by her I could soon after I came to the site. Why am I doing that? Why am I reading stories about this woman, when this is a web site for stories about men? She’s so beautiful. I don’t know how else to put it. As a person who sees how much men are put down in this life, I see her as beautiful. She is… Read more »

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Kunal

5 years 18 days ago

Amen David. I’m like you too. I love both the bodies and the brains of women. It’s too bad that in an effort to be the “knight in shining armour”- that I feel all men should strive to be – I have become the lonely, sexually repressed man armed only with a dim hope that one day I will find a woman who has a view like Lisa’s and – wow – actually cares about the MAN that is me. All because I keep running into women who are hell bent on toying with my affections rather than honestly reciprocating… Read more »

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Peter Houlihan

5 years 7 months ago

“You are so NOT a feminist Lisa. You’re the complete opposite.”

Trouble is, if alot of the people who call themselves feminist, like Lisa, are actually the opposite, how is it that the remainder defines feminism?

Its a compliment, if a somewhat backhanded one.

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

With a movement like feminism my own view is that 95% of membership is simple self-identification. Basically you’re a feminist if you say you are one. But there is that other 5%. In fact I think it is especially interesting when trying to determine the nature of the feminist movement (which is what I do) to ask which people are rejected by the larger body of the movement. Who crosses the line? Who is told they are NOT a feminist even if they claim they are? There’s no official mebership of course so this can only be determined by the… Read more »

See, as I see feminism, or as I grew up seeing feminism, she is a feminist. Because she isn’t denying either side. I’m a feminist and I love men, married a man, have male children, have male friends, and am writing here. Humanist, feminist, humorist, sexualist. What a great question Peter. I hear on this site a lot, “Well, why aren’t you decrying the radfems! Why aren’t you doing something.” Am I not? Here? By writing about people? By being as kind as possible on comments? By volunteering time to help moderate fairly? By learning? You don’t know what I’m… Read more »

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

It seems like it is really hard to communicate just how negative the feminist movement is without you (or whoever) becoming really defensive and taking it personally and so it either becomes an insulting response or a dismissive one or else (as here) you come across as if you feel you have to justify that you’re a decent human being to me which frankly makes me feel quite uncomfortable. Ideally what I want is this exchange: Me: Feminism really sucks. You: Oh but I think feminism = equality Me: That word really offends a lot of people and to them… Read more »

I’m going to reply to both this comment and your other one below, David. One thing that struck me today with the article where I called myself a “humanist” was how many feminists scoffed at me for it. Julie, you were on the thread on Hugo’s FB. A smattering of comments, all from people who are identifying as ‘feminists’: — “we need more feminist men and women out there not people who are afraid of the term and call themselves a humanist instead”. — “I get an ‘ugh’ when I when I heard someone talk about being a ‘humanist’ and… Read more »

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

The label thing…. a lot of the time critics of feminism get accused of making too much of it, but from what you are saying feminists are equally strenuous about what label to use. That does not surprise me. Still it is hard to see a commonality as to why in that list. The case for a neutral label is pretty clear I think. I would have guessed that feminists would basically be saying “you got to call yourself a feminist or you are being disloyal”. Some are along those lines but it’s hard to say all. I’m a statistician… Read more »

I agree there is some toxicity that is true. I am always willing to look into and accept that things are different than I think they are. What doesn’t make sense? I’ve personally never experienced feminism as a “hate movement” which is probably why I approach you from the personal perspective, but I’ll cease that as I don’t want to make you feel odd. And it’s probably beside the point. This has always been my reference point for feminism: 1: the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes 2: organized activity on behalf of women’s rights… Read more »

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

I’ve personally never experienced feminism as a “hate movement”

I suppose the question is, what does a hate movement feel like? How could you tell the difference? What exactly counts as a hate movement anyway? You’re already aware of people who call themselves feminists who are “really mean” shall we say. So how mean do they have to be? How many do there have to be? How much influence do they have to have? Who decides such things? What evidence is there and how would you measure it?

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

Warren Farrell was a feminist (head of the NYC chapter of NOW I believe) who one day decided to be critical of his own feminist beliefs. He decided to ask “is that so?” of a number of feminist assumptions and ended up developing a lot of masculist arguments, which got him kicked out of the feminist movement of course. So he wrote a book called “The Myth of Male Power” that listed a lot of ways in which men were disadvantaged and that was I think in the 1970s. So it’s a classic text of the men’s rights side of… Read more »

[…] Jaime, on Is It The End of Gender or The Beginning of Men? I applaud all the men who are willing to share their stories and explore their humanity. It shows […]

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Leia

5 years 7 months ago

I love men…I loved a man a long time ago and I listened and empathized….I listened to him for seven years to all his problems, his difficulties with supervising his co-workers, his struggle to get his PhD while working full-time, his problems with running a laboratory according to exacting standards all the while being unfairly accused of sexual harassment, his financial stresses involved with raising 3 teenagers, and his poor, unloving relationship with his wife….Yes, I was in love with a narcissistic, abusive man (who pursued me while I was a too young and too naive girl) and I only… Read more »

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Jaime

5 years 7 months ago

I applaud all the men who are willing to share their stories and explore their humanity. It shows us all how much more we have in common then there are differences. We’re all just out here struggling to figure out who we are and how we fit in this crazy world. I love The Good Men Project for it’s inclusivity, but also it’s male perspective. It’s refreshing and enlightening. I’m a feminist, but I have always believed that feminism can only go so far without men’s input and help. We all have something to learn from each other. Thank you.

Excellent piece, Lisa. There is a divide between acknowledging the abstract idea that gender is a social construct, and living the reality of our gendered lives. Gender itself isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. But our ideas about it need to be more flexible. Patriarchy is a system which limits everyone from fulfilling their (look, I used “their”) real human potential. It pits men in unnecessary competition with one another, and it devalues the contributions of boys and less traditionally “masculine” men. Both sexes suffer from this. Sexism is unfair treatment based on sex, and women certainly don’t have a monopoly… Read more »

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DavidByron

5 years 7 months ago

Ugh. It’s a lovely article; beautiful as ever from Lisa, but I have to say something else first, in response to the other comments. Aimed at nobody particularly; anyone who needs to hear this. Do people understand that the word “patriarchy” is deeply offensive? “Patriarchy” means “Men are crap, nasty, violent people. They are in charge of everything and everything is their fault.“. It’s the single most insulting anti-male word you could possibly use. Do you understand that? It’s like calling a black person the N-word. And I see that word thrown out all the time on this site. Sometimes… Read more »

It may not mean what he thinks it means, but it does what he says it does.

And I think that’s the point.

Anyway, using the word patriarchy to shame men(pretty much just for existing) will eventually have one of two results.

Either men will shut down emotionally and exit society, or they’ll just stop caring about hurting women.

Wee! What a wonderful world we’re creating!

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Unca Woofie

5 years 8 months ago

I take serious issue with complementing the Atlantic’s “The End of Men” article as “otherwise thoughtful”. Here’s why… First, the article seems to assume that before manufacturing jobs disappeared, every venue dedicated to making something was apparently a gender-based “sausage” operation of nothing but men. We all know this is not necessarily true, particularly since the mid-to-late 70’s which marked the end of the overwhelming number single-paycheck households and for most of us, was GONE by the beginning of the 80’s as economic necessity forced women into the workforce more than the fight for gender equality ever could (I watched… Read more »

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Justa Man

5 years 8 months ago

A pleasure to read this article. Isn’t it amazing how personal accountability and increased wisdom seem to go hand in hand?

What you have said, Ms. Hickey, whether you know it or not, is that you are no longer a feminist, but a humanist.

Your journey from living in fear of men will be complete when you make that official, but first you will have to fully tackle your fear of feminists.

Lisa, thanks for sharing your heart and soul. You and Tom (and all the others) make a great team. Its wonderful to see women and men coming together who aren’t afraid to focus on men. The world is a many splendored place and it generally comes in two genders–male and female. Its wonderful to have a place where we can celebrate men and women without having to mush us all together in some mythical, post-gendered, omelet . I understand why some people want to get rid of gender and just talk about us as human beings. For a long time,… Read more »

[…] Lisa Hickey’s article, Is It The End of Gender or the Beginning of Men? over at The Good Men Project, she writes about feminism, gender, and how men sort of have it hard […]

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thehermit

5 years 10 months ago

“I was taught to believe that the plight of women was so difficult that I failed to see that men had problems too.”

Until the day the term “feminism” is in use, it will be always like that. The one who is stupid enough to call her/himself a feminist (instead of- for example- humanist), also stupid and sexist enough to keep pushing the “dehumanisation of men” button, instead of thinking about it.
The name says it all.

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Eric M

5 years 10 months ago

This article shows that feminism is highly attractive to women who have issues with men. Which is no surprise but explains a lot.

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Jan

5 years 10 months ago

Thanks for a good article. 3-4 years ago, I started to think about whether I was a feminist or not. The more I read about it, the more negative I became. Feminism started out good (and has probably been necessary), but in my opinion, it has now gone completely off track and became destructive. So for me it was natural to enter into the mens movement, which I see as a more balanced ideology. You say “But why is it becoming impossible for men and women, in a discourse like this, to simply agree that women have it harder?”. For… Read more »

Macka, I don’t think we can avoid the ‘gender box’. This is Dr. Emerson Eggerichs’ take on avoiding the ‘Crazy Cycle’ between men-woman, mothers-sons, fathers-daughters. I hope it helps.
From: Love & Respect: The Love She Most Desires;
The Respect He Desperately Needs
By, Dr. Emerson Eggerichs

“WITHOUT LOVE,
A WOMAN IN DEFENSE, REACTS OFFENSIVELY
WITHOUT RESPECT
Or,
WHEN A WOMAN FEELS UNLOVED
SHE REACTS DEFENSIVELY
IN WAYS THAT ARE OFFENSIVE TO A MAN

WITHOUT RESPECT,
A MAN IN DEFENSE, Reacts WITHOUT LOVE
Or,
WHEN A MAN FEELS DISRESPECTED
HE Reacts DEFENSIVELY
IN WAYS THAT ARE OFFENSIVE TO A WOMAN”
‘Nuff said?

What I like most about this piece, and I really do like a lot about it, is that it manages to talk about the confliction between feminism and the new batch of gender-wranglers looking at the male side of the argument without throwing one side into the kneejerk “because they’re all a bunch of BASTARDS” box. So often I see “pro men” articles that can’t resist putting an unnecessary boot in to feminism, as if mere criticism wasn’t sufficiently spiteful. It’s an issue near and dear to my heart, as a male feminist with an interest in the interactions between… Read more »

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Eric M

5 years 10 months ago

Why aren’t male feminists content with the fact that they are free to wear mini-skirts, strapless sequined gowns, Steve Madden platform shoes, Victoria’s Secret lingerie or anything else their hearts desire? No one is stopping them.

Why do they obsess over the rest of us choosing not to cross dress? I suggest that they go about their business happily wearing their skirts and strappy heeled sandals or whatever else they want to wear and let us wear whatever we want? Sounds completely fair and reasonable to me.